Day 2: Prius Saves the Day
Never in our lives would we have considered taking a driving vacation in Europe if we had a traditional car. The thought of pouring a significant portion of our budget into gas was not a priority. But, at the same time we wanted to leave the big cities behind and explore more rural areas of France. Our boon came when we realized that Hertz would offer a specific Prius rental out of Avignon. Jacob has premium status with Hertz and it helped us get a fantastic rate of 375 E for a week with essentially an automatic that we also thought would save us on the large gas bill when all was said and done.
“Due to the gentleman being quite tall,” the agent in Avignon tried, “we would suggest this here,” said as she pointed to a Mercedes, small and gas guzzling. We insisted, “We have driven a Prius, we requested it specifically.” Resigned after two offers of a free upgrade and an additional attempt at an upsale, she resigned herself that we were going to want specifically what we asked for. So, after a brief primer from Jacob and documenting all of the scratches pre-existing on the car, I was out of the lot in no time if not just a bit nervous. It was also unnerving the first few times the gas engine cut out at a full stop but I quickly became delighted at how often it switched over to the electric.
All of our luggage (two rollers, a backpack, a duffle, and a laptop bag) fit snuggly into the trunk and were covered by the built-in draw cloth. While we didn’t necessarily need the backseat, we did need its legroom. With the front seats most of the way back, we could sit comfortably in the car. And it drove like a dream over the Alps. It can turn on a dime and is very responsive — an important feature on one-lane Alpine roads. On the mountain roads we averaged 6L/100Km (about 40 mpg) and got closer to 4L/100Km (over 50 mpg) down in the valleys. Not bad! The Prius also has a GPS as standard. While we had brought Jill with us, we frequently put on the Prius GPS as well for comparison’s sake.
By the end of day 2, we knew we had made the right choice of car for our style of vacation. By the end of the rental, it was confirmed. We drove 1017 Km in Sunday driving style and only had to put in an additional 60 E of gas the whole trip to return it to the rental full.
In short, we’d rent a Prius again for a European driving trip in a heart beat. We’re even considering it as our next car purchase for home.
2 comments
My diesel Peugeot 206 gets about 45 mpg too. It has good pickup and is quiet and nice to drive. It’s probably smaller than the Prius but some of the small European cars are just as economical as the Prius, I think.
Ken - I agree that, overall, European cars are more efficient regardless of their fuel source compared to American cars. Perhaps Detroit’s latest woes and rising fuel costs will inspire American car makers to finally build efficient cars — of course, then they would need the American consumer to be less caught up in “bigger is better” to make the sales. Fuel efficiency standards in the EU I think are just another way that Americans can count on stretching their vacation dollars a bit farther this summer.
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